Pakistan Politics

When it comes to the military and the judiciary, Pakistan’s journalists are “between a rock and a hard place,” Zohra Yusuf, of the independent non-profit Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, told CPJ. In recent months the judiciary, which has a history of siding with Pakistan’s powerful military, has remained largely silent amid attempts to censor or silence the press. Ahead …

Pakistan’s former prime minister Nawaz Sharif was arrested in Lahore airport on Friday as he returned to face a 10-year prison sentence which he claimed was part of a wide-ranging, military-backed conspiracy to deny his party a second term in an election due on 25 July. Military police boarded Sharif’s flight as it landed from a stop in Abu Dhabi …

Ousted Pakistani leader Nawaz Sharif is returning to Pakistan despite facing a 10-year jail sentence for corruption. Sharif and his daughter Maryam both face arrest when they arrive back in Lahore from London on Friday. The three-term PM was ousted from office last year after a corruption investigation. He was sentenced in absentia to 10 years last week. He has …

Distribution of the English-language daily Dawn, Pakistan’s oldest newspaper, is being disrupted in much of the country since it published an interview with former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns this latest attack on media freedom. The interview, which reportedly displeased the Pakistani military, appeared in the 12 May (Saturday) issue and the blocking began on 15 …

KARACHI (Reuters) – A Pakistani ethnic Pashtun rights group on Sunday staged its first rally in the southern city of Karachi, the site of a killing in January that sparked the movement and led to nationwide protests and rallies. The Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM) emerged after the January killing by police of Pashtun youth Naqibullah Mehsud in Karachi. A crowd …

Karachi, March 17: The first volume of the story of the National Students Federation, its cadre and incidents reflecting the left wing history of Pakistan, `Suraj pay Comand,’ was launched at the Arts Council on Saturday. An overflow crowd came to the launch to hear about the stalwarts of the left movement who dominated four decades ago. Their snapshots have …

In his latest book, Kaiser Bengali shows that there is systematic and wilful discrimination and apathy towards Balochistan with the express purpose of utilising its resources for benefit of others. Rebellions and insurgencies do not occur in a vacuum but are reactions against political and economic injustices. A new book A Cry for Justice: Empirical Insights from Balochistan by Kaiser …

Professor Dr Hasan Zafar Arif, MQM-London’s deputy convener, was found dead in a car in Karachi’s Ilyas Goth area on Sunday, police said. “The body of Hassan Zafar Arif, son of Maqbool Hassan, 70-72-years-old, was found from car number ANC-016, Lancer silver at Ilyas Goth,” station house officer at Ibrahim Hyderi police station confirmed. “The body was shifted to Jinnah …

New York, January 10, 2018—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Pakistani authorities to investigate today’s attempted abduction of journalist Taha Siddiqui, and prosecute the perpetrators. Siddiqui, the Pakistani bureau chief for the New Delhi-based television channel World Is One News, was in Islamabad on his way to the airport when 10 to 12 men stopped his car on the highway, …

Benazir Bhutto was the first woman to lead a Muslim country. The decade since an assassin killed her has revealed more about how Pakistan works than it has about who actually ordered her death. Bhutto was murdered on 27 December 2007 by a 15-year-old suicide bomber called Bilal. She had just finished an election rally in Rawalpindi when he approached …

Three years after the Army Public School Peshawar attack that claimed life of 144 students, the world might have moved on but not the families and victims of the massacre. Labelled as the bloodiest attack in the country’s history, it is hard to imagine the struggle of the victims despite moving three years down the memory. On the night of …

Pakistan’s rupee slumped to a near four-year low against the U.S. dollar Tuesday, the latest move downward in an effective devaluation of the currency that had been kept steady against the greenback for much of the past two years. The rupee’s slide began Friday and continued after Pakistan’s central bank signaled a drop in its value would help the country’s …

ISLAMABAD — In the past 10 days, two dramatic events — the government’s capitulation to a violent protest by radical Muslims and the release from house arrest of an anti-India militia leader — have crystallized the sway that hard line Muslim groups increasingly hold in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state whose military leaders claim to be fighting extremist violence. The freeing …

Former president Pervez Musharraf, in a video message on Wednesday, welcomed the formation of a political alliance between Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and the Pak Sarzameen Party (PSP), however, Musharraf did so even before it was formally announced. The video message was shared on social media from the official account of Musharraf’s political party — All Pakistan Muslim league (APML). …

Lahore, Pakistan – Ousted Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s wife Kulsoom has won a hotly contested by-election seen as the ruling PML-N party’s first key political challenge following the ex-premier’s recent dismissal. Kulsoom, 66, comfortably defeated the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) candidate Yasmin Rashid in the by-poll in the eastern city of Lahore, considered the Sharifs’ political heartland, on Sunday, …

Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) founder Altaf Hussain on Thursday met with United States (US) Congressman Dana Rohrabacher and self-exiled Baloch leader, the Khan of Kalat Mir Suleman Dawood Jan, at the MQM’s London Secretariat, according to a press release issued through the party’s website. The Khan of Kalat joined the latter half of the meeting, which included lunch and lasted …

Seventy years ago today, Mohammad Ali Jinnah took to the floor of the Constituent Assembly as its first elected president and delivered the iconic lines, “You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place or worship in this state of Pakistan. You may belong to …

Pakistan’s ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday insisted that his removal from office did not mean his future in politics was over, as he plans to go head with a rally this week and fight a legal battle to reverse his disqualification. “I don’t want reinstatement for myself. I am struggling to ensure the rule of law in Pakistan,” …

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan’s new prime minister called on Friday for an investigation into allegations that opposition leader Imran Khan harassed a woman lawmaker, charges Khan dismisses as revenge for his role in the ouster of then-premier Nawaz Sharif. A furious social media backlash threatening violence against Khan’s accuser, lawmaker Ayesha Gulalai, has also exposed raw nerves about the treatment of …

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, a politician educated in the United States, was elected prime minister of Pakistan on Tuesday. Parliament held a special election to replace his predecessor and mentor, who was disqualified on corruption charges. Here is what you need to know about Pakistan’s new leader. A Staunch Loyalist A steadfast ally of three-time Prime Minister Nawaz …